It would be inaccurate to characterize TSLA's solar division as the walking dead, only because it seemed to have stopped all movement some time ago...

Exclusive: Tesla to close a dozen solar facilities in nine states - documents

LOS ANGELES/SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - Electric car maker Tesla Inc’s move last week to cut 9 percent of its workforce will sharply downsize the residential solar business it bought two years ago in a controversial $2.6 billion deal, according to three internal company documents and seven current and former Tesla solar employees.

The latest cuts to the division that was once SolarCity - a sales and installation company founded by two cousins of Tesla CEO Elon Musk - include closing about a dozen installation facilities, according to internal company documents, and ending a retail partnership with Home Depot Inc that the current and former employees said generated about half of its sales...

The operational closures, which have not been previously reported, raise new questions about the viability of cash-strapped Tesla’s solar business and Musk’s rationale for a merger he once called a “no brainer” - but some investors have panned as a bailout of an affiliated firm at the expense of Tesla shareholders. Before the merger, Musk had served as chairman of SolarCity’s board of directors...

Analysts questioned Tesla’s plans for the solar business in light of the latest cuts to staff and retail operations.

In effect they seem to be saying, ‘We have no strategy for selling solar,’” said Frank Gillett, an analyst at Forrester Research, adding that the SolarCity purchase “looks pretty awful right now.”

FALLING SALESIn the first quarter of this year, Tesla installed 76 megawatts of solar systems - down from SolarCity’s more than 200 MW a quarter in early 2016, when it was the leading player in the industry...

In March, a Delaware judge ruled against a Tesla motion to dismiss a lawsuit by the company’s shareholders over the SolarCity deal. The lawsuit alleged Tesla’s board of directors breached its duties to shareholders by approving the merger.

. . . Fortunately, current owners and those that order before the deadline will keep all connectivity features that they’ve come to enjoy for free for the life of the vehicle. After the date, all new owners will still get Standard Connectivity for free, so you’re covered for the basics, including maps, navigation, over-the-air updates through Wi-Fi, firmware updates that require cellular data, and Bluetooth-based music and media streaming via your smartphone.

The paid Premium Connectivity Package gets you the in-car streaming music and media, over-the-air updates through cellular data, and satellite maps with live traffic visualizations.

Essentially, the necessities are covered by the free plan and you can use Wi-Fi for those that are not. This isn’t unlike many cell phone plans, nor is it different from several automakers’ packages and upgrades. Additionally, according to Teslarati, Tesla will likely only charge $100 per year for the upgraded services (~$8 per month). . . .

A further tightening up of the business model, to move towards profitability.

Guy [I have lots of experience designing/selling off-grid AE systems, some using EVs but don't own one. Local trips are by foot, bike and/or rapid transit].

The 'best' is the enemy of 'good enough'.Copper shot, not Silver bullets.

With everything that happens at Tesla — whether it’s Chief Executive Elon Musk’s comments to analysts, the fanatical enthusiasm people have for its cars, or the raised eyebrows from those skeptical over the company’s statements about its potential — it seems like there’s always a circus of activity and attention around the electric carmaker.

And the circus may be at its apex, given what recently sprung up on the grounds of Tesla’s auto-manufacturing plant in Fremont.

It’s a big tent. And “big” might be an understatement, because the thing is said to be the size of two football fields. When you build something that size, it’s kind of hard to hide it, so you might as well admit it exists.

Which is exactly what Musk recently did. And he also said just why the tent is there.

Elon Musk

Needed another general assembly line to reach 5k/week Model 3 production. A new building was impossible, so we built a giant tent...

Elon Musk has six days to make good on his pledge that Tesla Inc. will be pumping out 5,000 Model 3 sedans a week by the end of the month. If he succeeds, it may be thanks to the curious structure outside the company’s factory. It’s a tent the size of two football fields that Musk calls “pretty sweet” and that manufacturing experts deride as, basically, nuts.

“The existing line isn’t functional, it can’t build cars as planned and there isn’t room to get people into work stations to replace the non-functioning robots,” Warburton said in an email. “So here we have it — build cars manually in the parking lot.”...

James Womack, founder of the Lean Enterprise Institute in Cambridge, Mass., called Tesla’s haphazard approach worrisome. “The chaos of how Musk is going about this makes it difficult for him to provide the standardized, repeatable work routines that allow people to function,” said Womack, author of “The Machine That Changed the World,” which sprang from an influential study of Toyota’s production techniques. “He’s going to need a second tent for repair and rework.”

The word “temporary” may be in Tesla’s tent permits with Fremont, but Musk has suggested the tent could stick around awhile...

Fremont is working closely with Tesla to make sure that the tent is in compliance with building and fire codes, said Gary West, an official for the city. Tesla applied for a building permit to erect the tent June 7, according to municipal records. A permit has been issued for equipment installation, and one for an overhead fire sprinkler system is pending. The tent doesn’t have air conditioning, according to the city documents...

“It’s preposterous,” Bernstein’s Warburton said. “I don’t think anyone’s seen anything like this outside of the military trying to service vehicles in a war zone. I pity any customer taking delivery of one of these cars. The quality will be shocking.”

Scrambling to turn out its first mass-market electric car, the automaker set up multiple assembly lines and is changing production processes on the fly.

FREMONT, Calif. — Just outside the north wing of Tesla’s sprawling electric-car plant here, an unusual structure has taken shape in the last few weeks: a tent, about 50 feet high and several hundred feet long, its taut gray canvas membrane supported by aluminum columns.

Its purpose is as notable as its hasty construction. The semi-permanent structure houses a third assembly line — part of a desperate effort to speed up production of the Model 3, the car that Elon Musk, Tesla’s chief executive, has said is critical to the company’s financial health and immediate future.

Just two years ago, Mr. Musk envisioned 2018 as a breakthrough moment. Having established the brand’s cachet with high-end offerings — the Model S luxury sedan and the Model X sport-utility vehicle — Tesla would begin churning out more affordable Model 3 sedans. With a high-speed, high-tech assembly process, the company’s sales would soar more than fivefold, to half a million vehicles.

It hasn’t turned out that way...

“At some point, investors are going to say, ‘If you don’t have a viable economic model, we’re not going to continue to give you cash,’” Toni Sacconaghi, an analyst at Sanford C. Bernstein & Company, said in a recent conference call with clients...

Max Warburton, an analyst at Sanford C. Bernstein, estimates that Tesla spent about $2 billion to set up the Model 3 production line. “This is vastly more than we’ve seen any other car company spend on new capacity,” he said, adding, “$2 billion is a mind-blowing amount to spend on a second assembly line at an existing plant.”

For now, Tesla generates most of its revenue from the Model S and the Model X, which are priced at about $70,000 and up. Combined, their global sales add up to about 100,000 vehicles a year — too few to offset the billions Tesla has been spending to build its gigantic battery factory in Nevada, develop new cars and a semi truck, and equip its car plant.

That means the company’s future hinges on the assembly lines Tesla has set up to produce the Model 3 — and whether the company can make them hum.

The LAT apparently is still on the TSLA enemy list, and reports, from outside:

Elon Musk is about to reveal how many Model 3s he's making. But that won't answer all the questions facing Tesla

....Musk has been downgrading his ambitions for Model 3 production since May 2016. With Model 3 production at a trickle that year, he promised 5,000 cars a week — equivalent to 260,000 a year — by December 2017. That was put off until the end of March, and now the end of June.

According to Bloomberg’s Model 3 tracker, Tesla is now building 3,398 a week and so far has produced 38,559 Model 3s in total. In the past, Musk indicated 400,000 Model 3s would be built in 2018.

But hitting the 5,000-a-week mark will only raise new questions about the cash-burning company’s future.

Would a 5,000-a-week production level prove sustainable, or would it represent a one-off “burst” rate that won’t hold up?

Will demand continue as new electric cars from other luxury makers enter the market?

Even at a steady 5,000-car weekly pace of Model 3s, can Tesla sell those cars at a profit?...

On Tuesday, Tesla said it would open up the ordering process for all U.S. customers who’ve plunked down $1,000 deposits. That’s where deposit holders get a chance to configure their Model 3 and place an actual order and put down an additional and non-refundable deposit of $2,500. But buyers aren’t told before they pay up how long they’ll have to wait. They don’t know whether they’ll get their cars before the federal government’s $7,500 federal subsidies begin to run out, as expected at Tesla later this year. The original $1000 refundable deposit becomes non-refundable, too...

edatoakrun wrote: ...[NYTimes article:] “At some point, investors are going to say, ‘If you don’t have a viable economic model, we’re not going to continue to give you cash,’” Toni Sacconaghi, an analyst at Sanford C. Bernstein & Company, said in a recent conference call with clients..

So, Tesla's now building about 1000 EVs per day and is most likely profitable Q3,Q4. This should be celebrated. Is anyone else even trying? (maybe China). Toni Sacconaghi has a decent analyst rating with a "Hold" rating on TSLA. His big win that put him in the + column on Tipranks was Apple in 2009. Wow.

edatoakrun wrote: ...[NYTimes article:] “At some point, investors are going to say, ‘If you don’t have a viable economic model, we’re not going to continue to give you cash,’” Toni Sacconaghi, an analyst at Sanford C. Bernstein & Company, said in a recent conference call with clients..

So, Tesla's now building about 1000 EVs per day and is most likely profitable Q3,Q4. This should be celebrated. Is anyone else even trying? (maybe China). Toni Sacconaghi has a decent analyst rating with a "Hold" rating on TSLA. His big win that put him in the + column on Tipranks was Apple in 2009. Wow.

I don't own a Tesla, and don't have a reservation or any plans to buy one soon. (I have a Leaf). I do however, have Tesla stock. The Tesla bashers on this forum are simply ridiculous. They are also poor investors. Sure, there has been a lot of negative news about Tesla in the last year, but none of it was worth paying attention to. They never had a money problem. Any need to borrow a couple of billion dollars would have been supplied with much enthusiasm from investors. Their production rate has trended up since the beginning. In the scheme of things, being 6 months behind a marketed production target for the most ambitious product of my lifetime is absolutely meaningless. Their valuation is not too big when you consider the market potential for all their products. They have NO competition. Unproven offerings from other companies are inconsequential. How many iPaces will Jaguar make this year??? 5,000??? 10,000??? Even hyundai is struggling to make more than 15,000 EVs a year. Most EVs are limited because they are sold at a loss. Tesla is the first legitimate EV company, and I can't understand why any investor would think they will fail. The worst case scenario has always been a buyout, which seems crazy now.

Q2 production totaled 53,339 vehicles, a 55% increase from Q1, making it the most productive quarter in Tesla history by far. For the first time, Model 3 production (28,578) exceeded combined Model S and X production (24,761), and we produced almost three times the amount of Model 3s than we did in Q1. Our Model 3 weekly production rate also more than doubled during the quarter, and we did so without compromising quality.

GA4, our new General Assembly line for Model 3, was responsible for roughly 20% of Model 3s produced last week, with quality from that line being as good as our regular GA3 line. We expect that GA3 alone can reach a production rate of 5,000 Model 3s per week soon, but GA4 helped to get us there faster and will also help to exceed that rate.

Tesla expects to increase production to 6,000 Model 3s per week by late next month. We also reaffirm our guidance for positive GAAP net income and cash flow in Q3 and Q4, despite negative pressures from a weaker USD and likely higher tariffs for vehicles imported into China as well as components procured from China.

Q2 deliveries totaled 40,740 vehicles, of which 18,440 were Model 3, 10,930 were Model S, and 11,370 were Model X. Model S and X deliveries are in line with our guidance provided on May 3. As we previously noted, we are in the process of changing the quarterly production pattern of those vehicles for the various worldwide regions to ensure a more linear flow of deliveries through the quarter. Both orders and deliveries for Model S and X were higher in Q2 than a year ago. Our overall target for 100,000 Model S and Model X deliveries in 2018 is unchanged.

11,166 Model 3 vehicles and 3,892 Model S and X vehicles were in transit to customers at the end of Q2, and will be delivered in early Q3. The high number of customer vehicles in transit for Model 3 was primarily due to a significant increase in production towards the end of the quarter.

The remaining net Model 3 reservations count at the end of Q2 still stood at roughly 420,000 even though we have now delivered 28,386 Model 3 vehicles to date. When we start to provide customers an opportunity to see and test drive the car at their local store, we expect that our orders will grow faster than our production rate. Model 3 Dual Motor All Wheel Drive and Model 3 Dual Motor All Wheel Drive Performance cars will also be available in our stores shortly.

Kelly

2011 White SL-e (sold back to Nissan on 01/10/2013)2011Silver SL with new lizard battery purchased used on 9/9/20152018 Tesla Model 3 received 4/27/2018

But buyers aren’t told before they pay up how long they’ll have to wait. They don’t know whether they’ll get their cars before the federal government’s $7,500 federal subsidies begin to run out, as expected at Tesla later this year.

Both of those statements are misleading to the point of being FUD. Why quote them here?

You most certainly are told how long you'll have to wait. When I went to place an order for a dual-motor 3 on Saturday(*), it was 3-5 months. That's a wide window, for sure, but they told me.

And buyers do know they'll get their cars before the federal tax credit begins to be phased out for Tesla.

(*) and for several reasons, I choose to not place the order at this time.